Exercise- Induced Asthma

About a year ago I found out that I had exercise- induced asthma during pre-season of soccer. It's one of the worst feelings in the whole world.

I just remember not being able to breathe or get any oxygen into my lungs. It honestly makes you feel like you are about to die. I was so terrified that I started to cry and that made things 10 times worse.

If you feel like that ever while exercising, don't push through it. It's really serious, especially if you can't get oxygen into your lungs. Then it really could become harmful to you.

A trick I learned from my athletic trainer before I got my inhaler was to try breathing through my nose and out through my mouth whenever I started to wheeze. (Don't think you can get away without an inhaler, when you have a serious asthma attack you are going to need it!) It helps a ton and calms you down. You also start to get air into your lungs again although it may take a while until you feel better and even longer to get over the shock that you had an asthma attack.

*Don't continue exercising after an asthma attack that day! You need to get your lungs to relax and exercising again isn't going to help that.*

If this happens more than once go to the doctor!! I can't stress this enough, don't try and avoid it because I did and I started wheezing every time I would go running. Not being able to play on the field since you haven't gone to doctor yet and got yourself an inhaler since you were too stubborn isn't fun either.

*Make sure when you get an inhaler that you also get a spacer. It helps bring the medicine to your lungs because you are not supposed to taste the medicine- you want it to go to your lungs, not your tongue.*

Also, when you get your inhaler use it! It's not there for decoration. Again, I didn't use my inhaler about 3 weeks ago since I thought for some reason this time I wouldn't wheeze and then I ended up having a full out asthma attack which really freaked me out so I started using it again BEFORE practice- not when I got the asthma attack.

Exercise- Induced Asthma definitely got worse for me since I would continuously not use my inhaler when I first got it. Some things are okay to fight through but if you seriously cannot breathe stop what you are doing! Don't put yourself through it.

Now I have to use it anytime I'm doing any sort of running or activity that makes you pant or breathe heavily.

I just thought I'd share that with you since I don't want any of you to make the same mistakes. Please, if a doctor gives you an inhaler, use it!